This article is a transcribed edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in August of 2021. For the original video go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58QVkw4UbhM
Bob: Today we’re with Jordan who is a nutritional coach, and what’s the topic today?
Jordan: We’re talking about the worst diet recommendations, in our opinion. Well, I should say in my opinion, because I came up with this and we’ll see if you agree.
Bob: We’ll see if I agree. I have a little knowledge on this and that’s harmful to have little knowledge. You've got good posture. I have to work on my posture. So, while we start off, we’ll go over a couple of things today and we’ll make this a whole series. We’ll talk about a lot of different ones. So, what do you want to start off with?
Jordan: Let’s talk about calorie counting first. I would say in my field of work, this tends to be the most common, I guess question that I get. I’m not a big calorie counter to be honest, I’ve never counted calories.
Bob: Do you recommend counting calorie even at the beginning to get a sense?
Jordan: Yeah, for sure. If somebody has no idea and they’ve just been going their whole life eating whatever they darn well please and have no concept at all, then it can be very beneficial to do for a short period of time. For most of us, we could kind of just ditch that and focus instead on food quality.
Bob: Yeah. I am the personality type that would not want to count calories.
Jordan: No, and it’s temporary. Nobody can do it forever.
Bob: Right, they won’t. With the few exceptions, there are some people that are like engineers and stuff that want to chart everything. But I don’t think it would be good for a short period of time because I think people will be shocked at how many calories they’re taking in sometimes.
Jordan: Yes, absolutely. And I guess when I bring this up about calorie counting and the negative impacts of it or how it’s not so great is because not all calories are created equally. The trouble is if somebody is solely counting calories, putting it in an app, “All right I want to hit 1800 calories.” We’re not at all talking about food quality. So, I always emphasize that because the trouble is not all food is created equally. 300 calories of something does not equal 300 calories of another food. So, if that doesn’t make sense, usually I tell people, “All right, what about if I gave you a bag of M&M’s.” All right, that will give you about a little more than 200 calories, or I could give you an entire avocado and you’re going to be over 300 calories. Well in the calorie counting world, on your app, it’s going to tell you go eat the M&M’s because you have more calories left. Which I think we can all from a commonsense standpoint, agree that doesn’t make sense.
Bob: Right, exactly. It’s interesting though, one time we had somebody involved in nutrition onand he had a big bowl of just like greens and good stuff. And that was equal to just a little, small bowl of M&M’s. So, in that case, he’s like, I can eat this whole thing, or I can eat these M&M’s.
Jordan: Yeah, for sure. And with that, you can talk about nutrient density too and not to get all like scientific and out there, but when you’re talking about that example of that big bowl of greens versus this little thing of M&M’s, what do you get out of M&M’s? Honestly nothing. There are zero nutrients, zero vitamins, zero minerals, negative. But in this huge bowl of greens, you’re going to get tons of vitamins, minerals, all sorts of good stuff.
Bob: So, I guess you may want to count calories for a little while, then because you’re always trying to make this a way of life. You’re not trying to workout, do a diet for two weeks and then go intense. You’re trying to make a lifestyle choice.
Jordan: Correct. Usually if you set someone up with something like calorie counting, it can work well for 2-3 and maybe 4 weeks. Maybe 2 months if you’re really motivated, but nobody is going to do that forever, so I try to not introduce anything to clients that’s going to be a short-term fix.
Bob: You get discouraged and then you give it up and then you’re back to square one or even worse.
Jordan: Right.
Bob: All right, why don’t we move onto a separate topic.
Jordan: Another worst diet recommendation, I want to say, “Carbs are bad.” We’re told carbs are bad and stay away from them.
Bob: That’s really been popular. Like keto, but the thing about keto is, you can have some carbs.
Jordan: You can, to a degree.
Bob: Depending on your body type. If you tolerate carbs well, you can have a lot more carbs, than someone who doesn’t tolerate them well.
Jordan: Right. But I mean, the main thing even if you’re not doing the keto diet, we just think, I get this a lot too, like people being told that fruit’s not such a good choice because it’s so high in carbohydrates. I just don’t buy into that personally. Some people need more than others.
Bob: They have anti-inflammatory feature to them.
Jordan: A lot of us need some carbs. A lot of the population does, I think in the short term, like the keto diet, that can be a good tool for people. I mean, talking about, again, something you can do for your entire life. No, not all carbs are bad. Fruits and vegetables are filled with carbohydrates and there’s a lot more good in those than bad, in my opinion.
Bob: Now, some carbs that might be bad for you. Carbs from bread is not always good, right? Because you don’t have the whole grain?
Jordan: Right. I’m not a big proponent of anything good that’s found in breads and pastas. It’s just the grains that we have today, they’re just incredibly refined and there’s stripped of anything that could possibly be good for us. So, I usually tell people to get their carbohydrates and fill up on fruits and vegetables. That’s what we need.
Bob: If you want to stop anything, stop eating bread, especially that’s not all grain or full. I don’t know, what’s the word now?
Jordan: To me it’s all bad. There’s not much good on the shelves anymore as far as bread goes.
Bob: And of course, refined sugar is a bad carb too that you want to avoid. Sugary drinks. Desserts. You can have them, just don’t go crazy on them.
Jordan: A lot of stuff that comes in those middle aisles. That’s been advice that's been given for a long time and its good advice because there’s unfortunately not a lot of good in there.
Bob: So, what she’s saying is when you go to the grocery store, you want to avoid the aisles that are in the middle. You want to go on the outskirts.
Jordan: Right.
Bob: It’s all the fresh fruit and vegetables and I don’t know what’s on the other side of the store. The eggs are on the outside.
Jordan: Yeah, every store is set up a little different. Obviously not everything in the outside of the store is good and not everything on the inside of the store is bad, it’s just a good general rule. We could spend most of our time on the perimeter and stay out of the aisles with boxed food and all that.
Bob: Let’s take one more.
Jordan: Okay, last one we’ll talk about is eating a low fat or fat free diet in my opinion, is a bad diet recommendation. I think people are finally starting to, I don’t know, not be so afraid of fat?
Bob: I think they’re seeing what has happened. I mean, if you look back 30 years ago, I mean, I see videos of people in events that happened 30 years ago and everybody’s skinny. They were eating fats galore then. If you read up on the history of this, it was all a big mistake.
Jordan: It was. We could go into a whole video on the mistake of what happened in history and why we started eating fat-free, but that’s another topic.
Bob: There’s some good documentaries out there on it. What things are you looking for that might be a good source of fat?
Jordan: I’ll just kind of what I have. If you walk into my house right now and you would open my cupboard above my stove, that’s where I keep my oils. I have olive oil, good quality source, not a cheap, crappy, refined olive oil, but a good quality olive oil. I also keep avocado oil in there, and I keep coconut oil around too. That has some good uses as well.
Bob: Avocado oil, that’s what I started using based off your recommendation. Coconut oil is not going to be for me. I don’t like coconut.
Jordan: You don’t like it? Well, that’s not going to be for you. You will not find vegetable oil in my cabinet ever, you won’t find canola oil, I don’t even know what some of the other ones are. I don’t use any of that. Highly processed, highly refined. Other things, avocados, nuts.
Bob: Well, the thing you find out when you take in some fat, like in this form, it satiates you. It makes you feel full.
Jordan: Right, try a meal sometime where you don’t have any fat like go eat a lean chicken breast and some steamed broccoli and nothing else. Or get your broccoli and drizzle a little olive oil over it. But just that, even that small change, for example. You will notice yourself seem full for much longer.
Bob: You don’t find yourself rummaging throughout the cupboards, looking for something bad. Yeah, this has been unfortunately one of the worst ideas put on humankind right now.
Jordan: I would argue this should be at the top, number one.
Bob: Your thoughts on artificial sweetener?
Jordan: I don’t use them. I don’t touch them.
Bob: Even Stevia?
Jordan: I’ll use Stevia in small doses. I don’t have Stevia at home because I don’t really care for super sweet things.
Bob: It’s the best of maybe the evils?
Jordan: Correct. If it’s in something though that I’m going to have, I’m not going to put it back on the shelf. I will eat it, but who knows they’re going to come up with something in another 10 years that says that’s bad, because that’s how it works. But I try not to, it’s not in my diet every day by any means.
Bob: So, we covered three areas today and we’re going to cover more of these areas in the future so watch for the series on worst diet recommendations that you hear throughout the day. Thanks!
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